Tuesday, 31 December 2013

Two days ago, there was an
article in Deccan Herald about how apples in Bangalore have made a comeback and how the
first harvest of apples are being harvested in Lalbagh.

Bangalore had never grown apples and the credit for introducing
this fruit must go to the British, particularly the Superintendents who tended
to Lalbagh.

Apple was one of the many temperate
fruits brought to Bangalore
mainly to sustain the demand for such items from European civil and military officials.

The demand for apples and
other English and European fruits and vegetables had their beginnings in the
establishment of the Cantonment in Bangalore
in 1804.

The British had decided to
pull our their troops from Srirangapatna as they were unable to face the
mosquitoes. They choose Bangalore as their spot
for setting up the biggest Cantonment n south India.
The then Governor-General, Wellesley had asked several botanists and
naturalists, including Benjamin Heyne, whop was employed in the Madras Government
to take over Lalbagh in 1800 and introduce crops, including fruits and
vegetables palatable to the British.
Thus was born the first experiment in India to grow alien crops and this
started in 1800 and continued till 1807. Apple was one such fruit. Heyne also
introduced cocoa, durian, clove, nutmeg and mangosteen and the fist saplings of
these were planted in the Lalbagh.
By 1820, apples were popular in Lalbagh. In the same year, John Sullivan, the
Collector of Coimbatore, sent a few Apple saplings to Arthur Hope, the British
Resident in Bangalore
in 1820.
In 1880, the Superintendent of Lalbagh, John Cameron, introduced Rome beauty Apple to
Lalbagh. He actually imported seventeen varieties of apples and grew them in
Lalbagh. Of them, he found the Roman Beauty the best to grow in Bangalore. He then
introduced the Apple to other parts of Bangalore
and its surroundings such as Whitefield.

The seeds of Roman Beauty were
then distributed to farmers and owners of estates in Bangalore and Whitefield..Slowly,
the cultivation of Apple became popular and it soon became a commercial
crop.
Cameron also introduced a variety of fruits and vegetables in Bangalore, including chow chow, cabbage,
cauliflower, beetroot, radish, carrot, garden peas, turnips, rhubarb. Another
Superintendent of Lalbagh, Gustav Krumbiegal, introduced Italian olives,
Araucarias from Tasmania, and even caraway
from France.

Krumbeigel took a series of
steps to made the Apple a commercially viable and lucrative crop.

By the 1920s, Bangalore’s Apple were
named Roman Beauty and they had a unique taste. These Apples were grown in more
than a thousand acres in and around Bangalore.
It was very popular among Bangaloreans and it was sold in the neighbouring
districts too.

Compared to their counterparts in Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, the apples from Namma Bangalore were priced cheap and they had their own taste. Bangaloreans relished it and even the Maharaja of Mysore planted scores of apple trees in what is today Lower Palace orchard, Upper Palace Orchard and Vasanthnagar.

Several British bungalows and big houses of native Indians, as they were called, had trees that gave these Roman Beauties. People of all walks of life, including the British and large number of foreigners, relished them.
However, the change in the climate, growing urbanisation and depletion of the
green cover sounded the death knell for the apples. A disease quickly spread
among the apple trees and soon they became history.

Monday, 30 December 2013

It was sometime in 1804 and Bangalore was just a small dot on the map of India. It was
not even as big as Mysore, which had become the
capital of the WodeyarKingdom.

The new king of the Wodeyars,
Mumadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar (1794-1868), had gone about in right earnest rebuilding
Mysore which
had been ransacked and pillaged by Tipu Sultan years ago.

Though Tipu had died in May
1799 at the gates of Srirangapatna and the British had returned the MysoreKingdom
to the Wodeyars, the British were still wary of the south. The British forces
in the South were completely exhausted by the four Anglo-Mysore wars that they
had fought against Hyder Ali (1721-1781) and his son Tipu Sultan (1750-1799).

Though Tipu’s children and
grandchildren had been taken prisoners and kept in the Vellore fort (they were taken to the fort on
June 19, 1799), there was still a sense of uneasy among the remaining British
troops that had been billeted in Srirangapatna.FSherzada Hyder Ali, the grandson of Hyder Ali and son
of Abdul Kareem, had escaped from Vellore Fort and joined the Marathas in
1801.

The MysoreState
was on the boil and there were revolts in different parts of the Kingdom. The British
managed to suppress them, but they were vary of a backlash. They had wanted to
completely destroy the fortification of Srirangapatna but had been asked to
desist by the then Governor-General, Wellesley.

Wellesley had also refused to pay heed to the entreaty of the British officers to shift the Army from
Srirangapatna to Bangalore.

Though the British had
appropriated Bangalore to themselves, including
the Lalbagh, they had conveniently left out the Pettah or Pete areas or old Bangalore to the Maharaja
of Mysore, Mummadi Krishna Raja Wodeyar. Thus, old Bangalore was still in the hands of the
Wodeyars, while the fort was in the custody of the British.

The British had a substantial
military presence in Srirangapatna and Mysore.
The Wodeyars had shifted the capital of Mysore Kingdom from Srirangapatna to
Mysore and the boy king, Mummadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar, was assisted among others
by Dewan Purnaiah (1746-1812) and Barry Close (1756-1813), the British
Resident, in running the kingdom.

The British in Mysore were more uneasy
as they for the first time faced a sever drought. In one of the official
despatches to the Madras Government, Dr. Heyne, on August 25, 1804, reported on
the state of the garden- Lalbagh-under his care, stating that it had suffered
due to drought, and requesting permission to purchase around 400 sheep to
ensure a supply of manure for the Garden.

The Madras Government replied
from its headquarters in Fort St George, on March 23, 1804 and October, 16,
1804. Both these letters were regarding Dr. Benjamin Heyne's report on the
Botanical Garden at Bangalore.

It was in 1799 that Hayne had
taken charge of the gardens under the order of Lord Wellesley. Dr. Heyne was a
naturalist and a medical officer with the Topographical survey of Mysore. During the
surveys, economic, demographic, botanical, geographical and cultural data of Mysore was collected.

Botanical data was given
particular importance as Wellesley himself had instructed Heyne to take charge
of the Sultan's CypressGardens, called the
Lalbagh, and stressed that it should be turned into a botanical garden and
developed “as a depository of useful plants sent from different parts of the
country”.

Heyne also sent a letter to
Fort St George, dated April 27, 1803, proposing the retention of a small spot
of ground in Bangalore
for the purpose of cultivating the potato, turnip and other culinary
vegetables.

However, the drought of 1804
bothered him and he wanted the permission of the Madras Government to rectify
this.

If Heyne was bothered about
lack of manure and water to his Lalbagh, the British were concerned about the
severe drought in Bellary
during 1802-04 and again in 1805-07.

By then, Hayne had collected
a large variety of plants and trees, giving special importance to economically
useful plants and those that could be used medicinally. He left Lalbagh in 1812
to join and assists Francis Buchanan in his survey of Mysore.

He himself reported sometime
in 1812 that some plots of Lalbagh had
all but disappeared and the major part of the garden was under the cultivation
of ragi and rice.

At around 1804, the British
Residency was just shifted from Mysore to Bangalore and the official
residence of the British Resident of Mysore was the old post office building on
Madras Bank Road.

Unfortunately, there is not
adequate record of this drought though we are told that there was scarcity of
water and foodgrains and that the people of the Petta suffered most. The ruling
Wodeyars did their best to alleviate the suffering of the people.

However, this drought was as
severe or as painful as the one that struck MysoreKingdom, including Bangalore, decades later. The drought and
famine of 1875 that would sweep through MysoreState led to major changes in
lifestyle and economy of Bangalore and Mysore.

Yet, the drought of 1804 is
important as it is the first such natural calamity that occurred when the
British were ruling the south and they had partitioned the Kingdom of Mysore
between themselves, Wodeyars and Nizam of Hyderabad.

Thankfully, the Lalbagh had
developed into a world class garden by then and it continues to exist today and
the full credit for this goes to the foresightedness of its founders and its
many superintendents.

Sunday, 29 December 2013

The Lalbagh is perhaps the most
famous landmark of Bangalore
and it is one of the finest botanical gardens in the world. There are many
people whose association with the Lalbagh is still recalled with respect and awe.

If Hyder Ali and Tipu Sultan
are credited with having started the garden and also developed it into the charbagh
style, the British subsequently took pains to not only maintain the garden but
also develop it.

The names of botanists and
Superintendents of Lalbagh like James Cameroon, Krumbeigal, Mari Gowda and
others quickly come to the fore but there are a few others whose contribution
is as great as that of these men.

One such person is Benjamin
Heyne (1770-1819), a surgeon, botanist and naturalist. Heyne nurtured
Lalbagh during the early 1800s and it was he who gave the botanical garden its
present shape. What is more it is this man who introduced apples into Bangalore along with
several other fruits and vegetables.

It was in 1793 that a young Heyne
joined the service of the British East India Company. In 1796, he was assigned
to the Madras Presidency as Botanist to Samalkot (Samalkot today
is s small mandal in Andhra Pradesh and it is about 64 kilometres from
Rajamundhry. Samalkot then had a botanical garden and it was part of the Northern Circars that the British ruled).

In 1799, the British alliance
defeated Tipu Sultan in the fourth and final Anglo-Mysore war. The British
returned the MysoreKingdom to the Wodeyars and appropriated the LalbaghBotanical garden
in Bangalore.

The British decided to
transform Lalbagh as a “depository for useful plants sent from different parts
of the country.” They then ordered Dr. Benjamin Heyne, the Company’s botanist
at Madras,
to take charge of Lalbagh.

The order to preserve and
protect Lalbagh came from the Governor-General of India, Richard Wellesley. The
British asked Heyne to accompany the Surveyor, with the following instructions:

“A decided superiority must
be given to useful plants over those which are merely recommended by their
rarity or their beauty,... to collect with care all that is connected with the
arts and manufacturers of this country, or that promises to be useful in our
own; to give due attention to the timber employed in the various provinces of
his route,... and to collect with particular diligence the valuable plants
connected with his own immediate profession, i.e. medicine.”

Heyne was in charge of
Lalbagh till 1812. He set about the task he had been assigned with diligence
and he collected a lot of plants, shrubs and plants from Bangalore,
Mysore, Coimbatore
and even the Western Ghats.

A large collection of plant
specimens which were forwarded to London.
He collected more than 350 species from the Western
Ghats and more than 200 species were named by him. He also sent
many of his Indian botanical specimens to the German botanist Albreht
Roth, whose work “Novae plantarum” ) is largely based on these botanical specimen.

Coming back to the Survey
work he had been entrusted with, Heyne
was assistant to Francis Buchanan. Both took up and completed the epoch making
Mysore Survey.

Benjamin Heyne died at Madras in 1819 but not before he had been appointed to
superintend in 1803 the cultivation of potatoes and other culinary vegetables such
as turnip in the Company's garden in MysoreState. The garden, of
course, was in Bangalore.

He was also tasked with the
job of introducing bread fruit in MysoreState. Bread fruit
belongs to the mulberry family, Moraceae. In Karnataka, it is locally called divi
Halasu.

It is to him the credit must
go of commissioning botanical illustrations though none of them survive today. In
the eighteenth century, botanical illustrations had become important and
botanists depended on them to identify, classify and publish botanical
nomenclature. Heyne was keen to train ‘native' artists in identifying and
illustrating characteristics of plants and shrubs that he had collected and
planted in Lalbagh.

In 1803, William Bentinck wanted
Heyne to apply his “mineralogical
knowledge to the subject of gold sand, collected in the vicinity of Bangalore, and the mode
of extracting it from the stones in which it is embedded”.

He was an artist, freedom fighter,
legislator, newspaper editor and he was posthumously conferred the Distinguished
Citizen of Bangalore.

Yet, he remains an obscure figure
known largely in the field of painting. He was among the first few who loved
painting the many trees, flowering plants and the beautiful parks of Bangalore. He loved CubbonPark
and Lalbagh and he immortalized them in colours.

He excelled in painting landscapes
and he had a distinct and unique style of his own so much so that he was often
labelled as the Van Gogh of Bangalore.

Though he remembered for his
contribution to painting, he took to it only after he was 53. Till then, he was
a freedom fighter and politician rolled into one and he actively participated in
the Vidhurashwatha Sathyagraha in Gauribidanur taluk where several farmers were
killed by the British.

For two decades till his
death in a road accident in 1988, he was a familiar figure on the tree lined
avenues of Bangalore
and its gardens and fountains, who carried his own folding stool, easel and art
materials. He set them up wherever his eye caught the fancy and he got the urge
to capture it on paint.

Born more than a hundred
years ago in Dodaballapur, this man was none other than Rumale Chennabasaviah.
He was a man of several vocations and he started out as a freedom fighter. Born
in 1910, he was a freedom fighter till 1947 and then till 1963, a politician.
He took to painting only in 1963and today he is more remembered for his
landscapes of Bangalore
than for anything else.
Many of his paintings are in water colours though he was adept at using oil
paint.

It was his elder brother who noticed
his talent for art and enrolled him in Kala Mandir, in 1929-30. He then decided
to study art at the Chamarajendra Technical Institute (CTI), but he gave up after he met Mahatma Gandhi in
1934. Strangely, he exhibited 18 water colours at the Dasara Exhibition in Mysore in 1935 before
abandoning the profession to jump into the freedom movement..He participated in the Vidhuraswatha protest near Gauribidanur where ten people
were killed in the firing. He spent several months in jail between 1939 and 1940.

It was only after 1947 that
he decided to concentrate on his art but it was not until several years later
that he again took up painting. Meanwhile, he took over as Editor of Tainadu, a
Kannada newspaper, from 1956 to 1960.

In 1960, he went on to found
the Chitrakala Parishat and from 1962, he began taking painting seriously.

He soon became famous as Rumale
and today the Rumale Art House in 3rd Block, 45th Cross, Rajajinagar
has a collection of one hundred of his paintings. He loved CubbonPark
and Lalbagh and frequently painted tress and flowers from these two gardens.

On February 1988 morning,
Rumale died in Bangalore
when the autorickshaw he was travelling was hit by a factory bus just adjacent
to Lalbagh.

Tuesday, 17 December 2013

Bangalore has several temples dedicated to Someshwara or
Ishwara (Eshwara) and the most famous is the one at Ulsoor or Halsoor. The Ulsoor
temple was built by the Cholas and subsequently improved upon, enlarged and
renovated by the Vijayanagars and Kempe Gowda.

The Ulsoor temple is a marvel
of stone and it is a tourist attraction. Much has been said and written about
it but there is one more similar temple in Bangalore that has not received the attention
that it deserves. Nor is this temple on the tourist map.

Though the areas where this
temple is located is situated amid one of the most heavily traversed roads of
Bangalore, very few people and fewer motorists care to stop and spend time at
this temple.

What is more astonishing is
that this temple too is built by the Cholas and it is located in one f the
oldest localities of Bangalore.
However, neither Bangaloreans nor tourists seems to have heard of it, let alone
come to visit it.

This is the temple of Someshwara in Madivala. The temple is said
to be as old if not older than Madivala. The temple is a virtual delight for an
epigraphist as its walls are full of writings and records, some as early as
1247. This was the time when the Hoysalas were dominant in this part of Karnataka
and their Emperors, Vira Narasimha and Veera Someshara defeated the Pandyas, Gangas
and the Cholas.

The 1247 record refers to
lands donated “'below the big tank of Vengaluru” by a resident of Veppur, now called Begur. This probably means
that the earliest Bangalore
we know existed somewhere in and around Begur-Madivala.
Today, Madivala has lost almost all its links with the past. Talk of Madivala
and the only thing that springs to the mind is the Central Silk Borad Road junction and the
massive traffic hold up ever day.

The road engineering here is
so bad and the traffic so heavy that vehicles keep on piling up regularly and
at all hours.

None of the exhausted motorists
have any inclination or even desire to stop for a few minutes near the silk
board junction and take in the centuries old SomeshwaraTemple.

The Someshwara temple is a
structure in stone and large portions of its outer walls are covered with
inscriptions in Tamil and Snaskrit. The script used here to inscribe writings
in Sanskrit is Grantha and this is yet another proof of its antiquity.

This script was widely used
between the 6th century and the 19th century mainly by Tamil speakers in South India, particularly in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, to
write Sanskrit. This script is in restricted use in traditional vedic
schools or patashalas.

Other inscriptions relate to grants
made during the reigns of Hoysala king Ballala III and Chola king Rajendra. One
record, from 1365, mentions a land grant at Tamaraikkirai and this today is known as Tavarkere locality.

Apart from the inscriptions,
the outer walls are sculpted with images of
various gods including Ganesha, Durga and Vishnu.

The garba griha and artha
mantapa of the temple appear as they were constructed. These inner chamber is small
and dark.

There is a beautiful Nandi
placed in the artha mantapa. It faces the Linga, which is believed to have self
manifested.

Though the temple was built
by the Cholas, it was substantially renovated and repaired by the Vijayanagar
Emperors.

The temple is open for
worship from 7:30 a.m., to 11a.m., and again from 5:30 p.m., to 8:30 p.m.

Maha Shivratri, every
February, Pradosham which occurs once a fortnight and every Monday is special for
this temple.

The temple is very near the silk
board junction. It is located near the MariammaTemple
and the place to alight if traveling by BMTC bus is Kuvempu Nagar bus stand.

Monday, 16 December 2013

This is rated as one of the
finest palaces in the world and lakhs of tourists come every day to look at the
resplendent royal home. The palace has become so famous that it has been giving
the Taj Mahal of Agra a run for its money as the most visited monument in India.

Before Independence, the palace was not only the
centre of attraction but also the chief employer of the erstwhile princely
Kingdom. Though it was designed by a British architect, it is essentially an
Indian creation, combining many styles.

Strangely, this is not the
first palace but one of the many that stood there. The palace that stands today
was rebuilt starting from 1897 after a major fire destroyed most of the
structure during a wedding ceremony.

This is the majestic and
awe-inspiring Palace of Mysore, also mistakenly and more popularly called as
the AmbaVilasPalace, of Mysore. This is the official residence of
the Wodeyars - the royal family of Mysore,
which ruled the princely state of Mysore
from 1399.

However, what sets this royal
palace aside from others of its ilk is that it has never seen the death of a
Raja on its premises for over a hundred years. All the Kings and princes who
have sat on the ornate and magnificent Chinnada Simhasana or Golden Throne have
never died on the palace premises after the structure was rebuilt.

The last King to die in Mysore was Mummadi
Krishna Raja Wodeyar and this was sometime in 1868. Then, the palace was a
wooden structure and it had been built in 1799-1800 after the British had
killed Tipu Sultan in the fourth and final Anglo-Mysore battle.

The British had restored the
Wodeyars to the Mysore throne and Mummadi
Krishna Raja Wodeyar was crowned King in a makeshift tent in today’s Nazarbad
area of Mysore.
As Tipu had completely razed the erstwhile royal residence and forcibly
transported the royal family of Wodeyars from Mysore to Srirangapatna where he kept them
under strict watch, a new palace had to be built.

The palace, built of wood,
came up exactly at the very place, where the Main palace stands today. History
records that the first palace was built by the Wodeyars here sometime in the 14th
century. However, this structure did not survive for long and it was demolished
and reconstructed. The palace seems to have been constructed multiple times.

The current palace was
commissioned by then regent of Mysore,
Maharani Vani Vilas Sannidhna, in 1897 and it was completed in 1912 and
expanded later around 1940. British architect, Henry Irwin, designed the Indo-Saracenic
three-storied structure .

Today, the palace sees more
than 2.7 million visitors every year. Strangely, after Mummadi Krishna Raja
Wodeyar (1794-1868) died (March 27, 1868) in the old wooden palace, no other
reigning monarch has died here. He had ruled the Mysore kingdom from June 30, 1799.

After Mummadi Krishna Raja
Wodeyar, his grandson, Chamarajendra Wodeyar, the tenth, was enthroned in 1868.
Born in 1863, the young king was just 31
years of age when he passed way in distant Calcutta.

Chama Raja Wadiyar X was
also known as Chama Rajendra Wadiyar X ruled from 1881 and 1894. He was
born at the old palace or wooden palace in Mysore on February 22, 1863, as the third son
of Sardar Chikka Krishnaraj Urs of the Bettada-Kote branch of the ruling clan.
His father had died a week before his borth and his mother, Rajkumari Sri Puta
Ammani Avaru, was the eldest daughter of Krishna Raja Wodeyar, the third, the
then Maharaja of Mysore.

Krishnaraja Wodeyar adopted
as heir his grandson, Chamaraja, on June 18, 1865. This adoption was recognised
by the British Government of India on April 16, 1867. Since Mysore was under the direct administration of
the British from 1831, Chamaraja was handed over the Kingdom only in 1881.

Chamaraja Wodeyar died
of diphtheria in Calcutta
on December 28, 1894. His last rites were performed at Calcutta itself and even today there us a
small memorial where his last rites were performed.

Chamaraja was succeeded by
his 10-year-old son, Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV. Since he was young, his mother,
Maharani Kempa Nanjammani Vani Vilasa Sannidhana Avaru, served as regent
of Mysore, for
some tine.

Krishna Raja Wodeyar IV, also
known as Nalwadi Krishna Raja Wodeyar,
was the Maharaja from 1902 until his death in 1940. He died in Bangalore palace.

His successor, Jaya
Chamarajendra Wodeyar Bahadur,(1919 – 1974) was the 25th and the
last Maharaja of Mysore and he reigned from 1940 to 1950. Jayachamarajendra
too died at the Bangalore
palace in 1974.

Jayachamarajendra’s son was
Srikantadatta Narasimharaja Wodeyar. He was only a Yuvaraja and he was the last
scion of the Wodeyars. He too died at the Bangalore
palace just a few days ago.

Thus, we see that apart from
Vani Vilasa Sannidhana, who was the Regent of Mysore (1894-1902) and who died
in the Mysore palace,
none of the rulers have breathed their last on the premises.

The last reigning monarch to
die at the palace was Mummadi Krishna Raja Wodeyar and this was in 1868. Since
then, the rulers-Chamaraja, Nalwadi Krishna Raja, Jayachamarajendra and Srikanta
Datta-have all died outside the palace.

All these rulers with the
exception of Chamaraja have died at the Bangalore
palace which was built in 1862. This palace was bought or purchased by Chamaraja
Wodeyar in 1873 from Rev. Garrett, the
first Principal of Central High School of Bangalore.

What would you call this.
Coincidence or a mere play of history. Whatever it is, this is as mysterious as
the royal curse. Incidentally, both the palaces-the Mysore
and Bangalore
palaces, are under litigation and both act as the residence of the Wodeyars. A
section of both the palaces have been turned into private museums by
Srikantadatta Wodeyar. He lived, just like his father and grandfather, in both
the palaces.

Saturday, 14 December 2013

There have been several
queries on Vajra Musti Kalaga. Several people have either written or called to
find out how the sport is played and whether they can learn it.

Well, here are some details
and we hope it will be of some help.

The Vajra Musti Kalaga is a sport
played in Mysore only during Dassara and that
too only within the confines of the MysorePalace.

The name of the sport has its
origin in Sanskrit. The Vajra Musti refers to a knuckleduster-like weapon.
It also means the weapon which is employed in this unique forms of wrestling.
The weapon is called by many names such as ayudha, bhukhandi or Indra-mukti which
means Indira’s fist.

The Vajramusti is usually
made of ivory or buffalo horn. Its appearance is that of a knuckleduster,
slightly pointed at the sides and with small spikes at the knuckles. The
variation used for warfare had long blades protruding from each end, and an
elaborate bladed knuckle.

The Vajramusti is a fierce mode
of wrestling where the combatants wear
the Ayudha or Vajramusti on their right hand. This weapon has several small
holes along its length, so it can be tied onto the hand with a thread. This is
to ensure that it cannot be dislodged
during the fight.

A weapon similar to the
Vajramushti was also used by ancient Greek and Roman boxers and Pancrationists.
They called it the Cestus and this was a ring, usually made of bronze, worn
around the knuckles.

The first mention of vajra musti
is in Manasollasa, a reference work, of the Chalukya Emperor Someswara III
(1124–1138). However, history tells us that Vajra Musti was practiced even
during the times of Mauryas.

The first English account of
Vajra Musti is given by James Scurry (1766–1822), a British soldier
and memoirist. He was captured by Hyder Ali and imprisoned in Srirangapatna for
ten years from 1780.

After his release in 1790, he
reached an English camp. He then prepared a narrative of his captivity in 1794,
but it was published in 1824, after his death.

This work is called “The
captivity, sufferings, and escape of James Scurry”. In one of the chapters, he
describes the Vajra Musti thus: “The Jetti’s would be sent for, who always
approached with their masters at their head, and, after prostration, and making
their grand salams, touching the ground each time, they would be paired, one
school against another. They had on their right hands the wood-guamootie -vajra-musti-
of four steel talons, which were fixed to each back joint of their fingers, and
had a terrific appearance when their fists were closed. Their heads were close
shaved, their bodies oiled, and they wore only a pair of short drawers. On
being matched, and the signal given from Tippu, they begin the combat, always
by throwing the flowers, which they wear round their necks, in each other’s
faces; watching an opportunity for striking with the right hand, on which they
wore this mischievous weapon which never failed lacerating the flesh, and
drawing blood most copiously. Some pairs would close instantly, and no matter
which was under, for the gripe was the whole; they were in general taught to
suit their holds to their opponent’s body, with every part of which, as far as
concerned them, they were well acquainted. If one got a hold against which his
antagonist could not guard, he would be the conqueror; they would frequently
break each other’s legs and arms”.

After Tipu died in 1799, the
Wodeyar Kings of Mysore continued patronising it. Over decades, it slowly lost
out to other sports and was restricted to the royalty. It then became an integral
part of the Dasara and came to be reduced as a ritual.

The Kalaga now precedes the
Jumbo Savari on Vijaya Dashami and it is personally inaugurated by the
Maharajas of Mysore. After the last Maharaja, Jayachamarajendra Wodeyar, died,
it was his son, Srikantadatta Narasimnharaja Wodeyar who inaugurated this ancient
sport in the palace courtyard.

The sport commences on Vijaya
Dashami and it takes place at the Savari Thotti, the courtyard in the Mysore palace. The Jumboo
Savari procession commences immediately after this ritual.

This year, that is 2013, the
Vajra Musti Kalaga began with Yuvaraja, Srikantadatta Narasimharaja Wodeyar, performing
pooje between 9.15 a.m., and 9.25 a.m., in the auspicious Vrischika lagna.

The palace priests, Narasimha
Sharma and Manjunath Sharma, chanted the slokas after which the Kalaga or fight
between Jetties commenced at 9.50 am.

This year, for jetties
participated in the contest. Narayana Jetty from Bangalore, Vijaykumar Jetty
from Mysore, Anil Jetty from Channapatna and Shamanth Kumar Jetty from Chamarajanagar.

The contest is stooped even
as the first blood spills. Narayana Jetty

drew the first
blood by pinning down Mysore’s
Vijay Kumar Jetty. Srikantadatta Wodeyar
then pierced a pumpkin with a dagger,

signaling the commencement of
Vijaya Yatre or victory parade.

Senior jetties Srinivas Jetty
and Tiger Balaji were the referees of the the bout.

By the way, R Vijaykumar
Jetti is an autorickshaw driver from Mysore.
You can ask his address at the MysorePalace office or any autorickshaw driver hailing from
Mysore.

Last year, Manjunath Jetty, a
KSRTC driver, had represented Mysore
and had won the bout. The KSRTC officials will have details about him, if not
the conductors and drivers.

Even today, members of the
Jetty or Jetti community are found in large numbers in Mysore,
Chamarajanagara, Channapatna and Bangalore.
They originally hailed from Delmal in Gujarat but migrated to Vijayanagar first
and Mysore next
when they saw that the Mysore Kingdoms –of Hyder, Tipu and Wodeyars-patronised
wrestling.

History tells us that the
first migration of the Jettys from Gujarat was in the 11th century when the
Hoysalas ruled Mysore.

If you want more details
abpout jettys and their art, you can contact M.R. Madhava, son of M.R.
Sudarshan of the Jetty family, who lives in Mysore.

The family of Madhava is synonymous with the vajra mushti
kalaga. They trace their fighting skills to the times of Tipu Sultan. When Kari
Jatappa, great great grandfather of Madhava, was a Raja Vastadi or royal
courtier. Another well-known Vajra musti exponent in this family is Rama
Jattappa who was patronised by Mummudi Krishnaraja
Wodeyar.

Rama Jatappa was considered
to be invincible and people treated him with a lot of respect. They would say “Aakashakke
eeni ella, Rama Jatappange kustili sati ella” (Just as there is no ladder to
the sky, there is no equal to Rama Jatappa). Another wrestler in the family was
M.R. Jatappa who supplied agarbattis to the palace durbar. It was famous all
over India.
His son was M.R. Sudarshan, who was conferred the title Mr. Body Builder
Mysore and with Mr. Olympics in Madras.

Tiger Balaji, the referee is
one of the five sons of M R. Sudarsha.
The other brothers of Tiger Balaji are Ramji, Basavanna, Arvind and
Madhav. All five were experts in wrestling and M.R. Madhava specialised in
Varja Musti.

Now coming to the contact
details, in case anyone is interested in getting more details about the sport or
the participants, please check with the Mysore Palace Board. This board is in
charge of the MysorePalace and is involved in
its day to day running. If you fail to get information here, you can contact
the office of the late Srikantadatta
Wodeyar and we are sure they will be happy to help you out.

There are many akhadas or
wrestling houses in Bangalore and Mysore and they will be
able to give you more details. If you still fail to gather information, check
out with the Karnataka Wrestling Federation. They should be having some
information. If all this fails, head straight to Mysore, talk to the auto drivers and ask them
to take you to the house of Madhava or
any other Jetty.